It's been a while, make sure your shoes are one, we're gonna look at some Shattered Glass, Sideswipe!
Well, this guy is a bit of a clever mix of stuff, which is kinda nice. Unlike Treadshot. Sideswipe here apparently took his colour scheme from Drench after he was killed by the plans of Evil Optimus and then had an attempted assassination upon his good self, hence the damaged hood and change of sides.
This is because the original toy was based upon the Armada Wheeljack/Micron Rampage body, which was an ex-Autobot, now Decepticon guy.
Thanks to Unicron.com for this bio card of the original:
Now, this new version is for the legacy line and so is based off of the Earthrise Red Alert/Siege Sideswipe body. It doesn't have a bio as such, but it does come in a nice box. However, the art isn't as spanking as the regular retail lines for some reason.
Note that Sideswipe has a rifle in his hand, one that he doesn't actually get. That's because they just used the art from the ER figures, but at least he has a new head on!
All right, first we're gonna have a look at his robot mode, as I quite like it! He comes with a Minicon pal called Whisper. Minicons are great!
He comes with the Red Alert/Sideswipe (from now on to be referred to as the "Lambros"), shoulder launcher and a couple of "clubs" as weapons. On the Armada toy, the clubs were missiles that stashed in the cars gull wing doors. Here they are completely new for this body!
The colours are gloriously G2 and I love them. They work really well and are nicely thought out and spread about the body.
Sideswipe here is sporting a new head, that is the one form the Armada toy. No doubt we will get an Armada Wheeljack release. Hopefully they take the colours from Micron Rampage though. The charcoal of WJ doesn't look as nice as the deep black TakTom did on Rampage.
I actually love the headsculpt and also am very impressed with the paintwork on this guy's face. It looks so good!
There's quite a bit going on there.
Panning down his sexy body, we see the centrepiece and what makes this character a little special, a teeny bit cooler than your average Lambro. A big arse scar! They've remoulded the hood/chest piece to have the gash across the Autobot symbol and even moulded in some little enginey greebles underneath. THEN, there is a cute little Heroic Decepticon insignia underneath.
The Evil Autobot symbol is sculpted in, as is the raised area for the Decepticon one!
The waist and knees are nicely coloured. I'm pleased to say the generally, the paint, plastic and painted plastic all manage to looks extremely close to each other.
Overall a nicely coloured figure. If you have any of the ER/Kingdom versions, even the Siege version of this vehicle mode, you know what you're in for. If you don't, know that it is a solid figure. Not amazing, with hidden secrets and incredible engineering, but decent. It gets the job done and looks good while doing it.
Nicely the newly created Whisper also manages to do a decent job. The Minicons rarely had heads that weren't drone looking, and that continues here, but Whisper's articulation is quite good and balances fairly well, especially for a little guy.
Now onto their accessories. SS comes with the typical Lambro shoulder cannon and a couple of batons. The shoulder launcher is typical Lambro fare, but it is using the same moulding as the one from Clampdown, which has a bit of a small annoyance.
That annoyance is that the part that provides the friction connection has been shortened, so now when in the launcher, it has barely any area to grab with. It manages to have a thin pin thing sticking out the back as well. Very odd.
 |
| L is Red Alert's, Mid is Swipe's and R is Clampdown's. |
Now, while that also may seem a little pendatic, it does affect the way the launcher works with effect parts. That is, not as good as it should. Now you are unable to plant the missile into any effect parts. Or you can, but it just sits there loosely and flops about.
The clubs manage to fit rather nicely in his hand and look all right. Min have some battle damage (ha ha) on them. Sadly though there is no way to store them on the robot mode. Except for in his hands when he is wielding them.
Sideswipe is a good size and fits well with other deluxes.
Since I love my Lambos, I also have a couple of the other colours that use this mould. Since I'm am going through a bit of a white boi phase with Transformers, I have the ones that use white.
Note that the light bars on Red Alert (left) and Clampdown (right) are extra pieces that go in the hole in the back.
If you're wondering about Sideswipe's hole in the back being lonely, never fear! That's where Whisper comes in! Since this mould is based on Armada and the Armada toys could all "powerlink" with Minicons in some way, Whisper can join with Sideswipe! How deeeelightful!
I think this is pretty neat! Whisper pretty much transforms and then flips his legs over to expose his peg (oo-er) and plugs into the back of Sideswipe. Officially, Whisper is supposed to become a shield for Sideswipe, but the fact that Whisper isn't flat, kinda makes him a bit silly as a shield, so in the Tetsaverse, Whisper serves as Sideswipe's jetpack.
This can be done for SS Vehicle mode too. But since we've just half spied Whisper in vehicle mode, let's check out the whole thing.
He transforms into a chibi-chubby stealth plane I guess.
Naturally with a form like this, he doesn't look all that likely to fly, but hey, we are talking about living robots that become vehicles here.
Luckily Transformation is pretty easy. As is Sideswipe's which is nice, because he looks goooood!
OOh, that vehicle mode is so good! Flat, sporty, SEXY.
He still sports the damaged bonnet. I really dig the colouring and the way the stripes are done on the back!
You can plug the launcher into the roof, or the holes on the side if you like, but it looks a bit silly. He does look very nice when compared to his lambros.
You can chuck Whisper on the top of the car and the batons can store on the side.
Now, I had two pictures above that had him powerlinked to Whisper, so I just wanted to let you know that this can be replicated with the car as well. Well, not replicated, that was a bad choice of words. Or phrasing actually. The point I want to make is that the original Armada toy had a flight mode that needed Minicon activation. This one doesn't need it for activiation, but it's super cool it was included.
Swing up the doors, slap the batons on them, plonk Whisper on the roof and
Un-aerodynamic Flight mode activated!!!
Oh man, it's so stupid I love it!
Pardon me while I make whoosh noises and run around the house! It's so fun!
Okay, so I think that is all the photos I have of the guy. Man I dig him, I think he is probably my favourite of the Lambros. Which isn't saying much I guess, they are simple figures, but I think their brilliance lies in how simple they are. Super easy to transform, fun to pose, fun to vroom
FUN TO WHOOOSH!
Just fun, which is the hallmark of a good toy in my humble opinion. Sideswipe and Whisper here are helped immensely by their colours, and combo ability. SS has a great new head sculpt that really makes him stand out form his other Lambros and the colours just speak for themselves.
So I guess, I'll leave it up to my final superfluous rating:
No comments:
Post a Comment
Comments under moderation until I find around this spam thing.